DEATH AND HUMOR IN THE FIFTIES: THE IGNITION OF BARTH, HELLER, NABOKOV, O'CONNOR, SALINGER, AND VONNEGUT

This study argues that death and humor is a major movement in contemporary American literature, and analyzes American literary works of the fifties in the context of the era in which they were published. Representative samples selected for this study are: John Barth's The Floating Opera, Joseph Heller's Catch-22, Vladimir Nabokov's Lolita, Flannery O'Connor's The Violent Bear It Away, J. D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye, and Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.'s Player Piano.;Within American literary works of the fifties, death is often expressed as a fear so overpowering that it reduces the individual to nonexistence; moreover, institutions such as the law cannot be relied upon by the individual for the support he needs.;The first chapter attempts to define the death and humor movement. The second chapter explores the concept of death as a primary fear of our fifties protagonists and shows how this fear works as a primary structural device of the selected novels. The third chapter suggests that death anxiety often results in the effacement of the individual. The fourth chapter argues that institutions, such as the law, are inadequate supports for the individual whose identity is fading in the face of death. The fifth chapter looks at where the idea of death and humor has been moving since the fifties.